A Death Note Christmas Carol
by Maiku's Requiem
Summary: Three Death Gods visit the miserly Light Yagami on Christmas Eve.
1. Mikami's Ghost

Charles Dickens' Classic Story, _A Christmas Carol_, told with characters from Death Note.

* * *

_Mikami was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Light signed it. And Light's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Mikami was as dead as a doornail. Light knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Light and he were partners many years. Light was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole friend, and sole mourner. And even Light was not so dreadfully cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent man of business on the very day of the funeral, and solemnized it with an undoubted bargain._

_He was a tight-fisted hand at the grind- stone. Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire. Secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his features, made his eyes red, He carried his own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dogdays; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas. External heat and cold had little influence on Light. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. They often "came down" handsomely, and Light never did._

Once upon a time -- of all the good days in the year, on Christmas Eve -- Light sat busy in his counting house. It was cold, bleak, biting weather: foggy withal: and he could hear the people in the court outside, go wheezing up and down, beating their hands upon their breasts, and stamping their feet upon the pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already: it had not been light all day: and candles were flaring in the windows of the neighboring offices, like ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog came pouring in at every chink and keyhole, and was so dense without, that although the court was of the narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms. To see the dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring everything, one might have thought that Nature lived hard by, and was brewing on a large scale.

The door of Light's counting house was open that he might keep his eye upon his clerk, Ryuzaki who in a dismal little room beyond was copying letters. Light had a very small fire, but Ryuzaki's fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn't replenish it, for Light kept the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the Ryuzaki came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore Ryuzaki put on his white blanket, and tried to warm himself at the candle; in which effort, despite being a man of a strong imagination, he failed.

"A merry Christmas, Light! God save you!'' cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Matsuda, who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation he had of his approach.

"Bah!'' said Light, "Humbug!"

Matusda was all in a glow; his face was ruddy and handsome; his eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked again.

``Christmas a humbug, Light!'' said Matsuda. ``You don't mean that, I am sure.''

``I do,'' said Light. ``Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry? You're poor enough.''

"Come, then," returned the Matsuda gaily. "What right have you to be dismal? You're rich enough.''

Light having no better answer ready on the spur of the moment, said, "Bah!" again; and followed it up with "Humbug."

"Don't be cross, Light," said the Matsuda.

"What else can I be," returned Light, "when I live in such a world of fools as this Merry Christmas! Out upon merry Christmas. What's Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer? If I could work my will,'' said Light indignantly, "every idiot who goes about with "Merry Christmas'' on his lips, should be judged and buried with a stake of holly through his heart.

"Light!" Pleaded Matusda.

"Matusda!" Returned Light, sternly, "keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine."

"Keep it!" repeated Matsuda. ``But you don't keep it.''

"Let me leave it alone, then,'' said Light. "Much good may it do you! Much good it has ever done you!"

"There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say," returned Matsuda: "Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time. The only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave. And therefore, Light, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!''

Ryuzaki, involuntarily applauded. Becoming immediately sensible of the impropriety, he poked the fire, and extinguished the last frail spark forever.

"Let me hear another sound from _you_,'' said Light, "and you'll keep your Christmas by losing your situation.  
"Don't be angry, Light." Said Matsuda, "Come! Dine with us tomorrow."

"Good afternoon!"

"I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas, and I'll keep my Christmas humor to the last. So A Merry Christmas, Light!''

"Good afternoon!'' said Light.

"And A Happy New Year!''

"Good afternoon!'' said Light.

Matsuda left the room without an angry word, notwithstanding. He stopped at the outer door to bestow the greeting of the season on Ryuzaki, who, cold as he was, was warmer than Light; for he returned them cordially.

"There's another fellow,'' muttered Light; who overheard him: "Ryuzaki, with fifteen shillings a week and a family, talking about a merry Christmas." Ryuzaki, in letting Matsuda out, had let two other people in. They were Aizawa and Mogi, pleasant to behold, and now stood, with their hats off, in Light's office. They had books and papers in their hands, and bowed to him.

"Yagami and Mikami's, I believe,'' said Aizawa, referring to his list. "Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Yagami or Mr. Mikami?"

"Mr. Mikami has been dead these seven years,'' Light replied. ``He died seven years ago, this very night."

"We have no doubt his generosity is well represented by his surviving partner,'' said Mogi, presenting his credentials. At the ominous word 'generosity', Light frowned, and shook his head, and handed the credentials back.

"At this festive season of the year, Mr. Yagami,'' said Aizawa, taking up a pen, "it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.''

``Are there no prisons?'' asked Light.

``Plenty of prisons,'' said Aizawa, laying down the pen again.

"Are they still in operation?'' demanded Light.

"They are. Still,'' returned Aizawa, "I wish I could say they were not."

"Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,'' said Light. "I'm very glad to hear it.''

"A few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth." Returned Mogi, "We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?''

"Nothing!'' Light replied.

"You wish to be anonymous?''

"I wish to be left alone," said Light. "I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned: they cost enough: and those who are badly off must go there."

"Many can't go there; and many would rather die."

"If they would rather die,'' said Light, "they had better do it, and decrease the unworthy population."

Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point, Aizawa and Mogi withdrew. Light resumed his labors with an improved opinion of himself, and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him.

At length the hour of shutting up the counting house arrived. With an ill-will, Light dismounted from his stool, and tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant Ryuzaki, who instantly snuffed his candle out, and put on his hat.

"You'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose?" said Light.

"If quite convenient, Sir."

"It's not convenient," said Light, "and it's not fair. If I was to stop half-a-crown for it, you'd think yourself ill-used.''

Ryuzaki smiled faintly.

"And yet," said Light, "you don't think me ill-used, when I pay a day's wages for no work."

"It is only once a year." Ryuzaki observered.

"A poor excuse for picking a man's pockets every twenty-fifth of December!" Said Light, buttoning his coat. "But I suppose you must have the whole day. Be here all the earlier next morning!"

Ryuzaki promised that he would; and Light walked out with a growl. The office was closed in a twinkling, and Ryuzaki, with the long ends of his blanket dangling below his waist for he boasted no coat, went down a slide, at the end of a lane of boys, twenty times, in honor of it being Christmas Eve, and then ran home.


	2. Mikami's Ghost II

A Death Note Christmas Carol-Mikami's Ghost. Part 2

Light went home to bed. He lived in chambers, which had once belonged to his deceased partner. It was old enough now, and dreary enough, for nobody lived in it but Light, the other rooms being all let out as offices. The yard was so dark that even Light, who knew its every stone, was fain to grope with his hands. The fog and frost so hung about the black old gateway of the house, that it seemed as if the Genius of the Weather sat in mournful meditation on the threshold.

Now, it is a fact, that there was nothing at all particular about the knocker on the door, except that it was very large. It is also a fact, that Light had seen it, night and morning, during his whole residence in that place. Let it also be borne in mind that Light had not bestowed one thought on Mikami, since his last mention of his seven years' dead partner that afternoon. And then let any man explain, if he can, how it happened that Light, having his key in the lock of the door, saw in the knocker, without its undergoing any intermediate process of change -- not a knocker, but Mikami's face.

As Light looked fixedly at this phenomenon, it was a knocker again.

To say that he was not startled would be untrue. But he put his hand upon the key he had relinquished, turned it sturdily, walked in, and lighted his candle.

He did pause, with a moment's irresolution, before he shut the door; and he did look cautiously behind it first, but there was nothing on the back of the door, except the screws and nuts that held the knocker on, so he closed the door with a bang.

The sound resounded through the house like thunder. Light fastened the door, and walked across the hall, and up the stairs; slowly too: trimming his candle as he went. Half a dozen gas-lamps out of the street wouldn't have lighted the entry too well, so you may suppose that it was pretty dark. Up Light went, not caring a button for that. Darkness is cheap, and Light liked it. But before he shut his heavy door, he walked through his rooms to see that all was right. Quite satisfied, he closed his door, and locked himself in; double-locked himself in, which was not his custom. Thus secured against surprise, he took off his cravat; put on his gown and slippers, and his nightcap; and sat down before the fire to take his gruel.

It was a very low fire; nothing on such a bitter night. He was obliged to sit close to it, and brood over it, before he could extract the least sensation of warmth from such a handful of fuel. "Humbug!" said Light; and walked across the room.

After several turns, he sat down again. As he threw his head back in the chair, his glance

happened to rest upon a bell. It was with great astonishment, and with a strange, inexplicable dread, that as he looked, he saw this bell begin to swing. It swung so softly in the outset that it scarcely made a sound; but soon it rang out loudly, and so did every bell in the house.

This might have lasted half a minute, but it seemed an hour. The bells ceased as they had begun, together. They were succeeded by a clanking noise, deep down below; as if some person were dragging a heavy chain over the casks in the cellar. Light then remembered to have heard that ghosts in haunted houses were described as dragging chains.

The cellar-door flew open with a booming sound, and then he heard the noise much louder, on the floors below; then coming up the stairs; then coming straight towards his door.

"It's humbug still!" said Light. "I won't believe it."

It came on through the heavy door, and passed into the room before his eyes. Upon its coming in, the dying flame leaped up, as though it cried, "I know him; Mikami's Ghost!" and fell again.

The same face: the very same. Mikami in his usual waistcoat, tights and boots. The chain he drew was clasped about his middle. It was long, and wound about him like a tail; and it was made (for Light observed it closely) of cash-boxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds, and heavy purses wrought in steel. His body was transparent, so that Light, observing him, and looking through his waistcoat, could see the two buttons on his coat behind.

Though he looked the phantom through and through, and saw it standing before him; though he felt the chilling influence of its death-cold eyes; and marked the very texture of the folded kerchief bound about its head and chin, which wrapper he had not observed before: he was still incredulous, and fought against his senses.

"How now!" said Light, caustic and cold as ever. "What do you want with me?"

"Much!" – Mikami's voice, no doubt about it.

"Who are you?"

"Ask me who I was."

"Who were you then?" said Light, raising his voice.

"In life I was your partner, Teru Mikami."

The ghost sat down on the opposite side of the fireplace, as if he were quite used to it.

"You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.

"I don't." said Light.  
"Why do you doubt your senses?"

"Because," said Light, "a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!"

At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that Light held on tight to his chair, to save himself from falling in a swoon. But how much greater was his horror, when the phantom taking off the bandage round its head, as if it were too warm to wear indoors, its lower jaw dropped down upon its breast!

Light fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands before his face.

"Mercy!" he said. "Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me?"

"Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost, "do you believe in me or not?"

"I do," said Light. "I must. But why do spirits walk the earth, and why do they come to me?"

"It is required of every man," the Ghost returned, "that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellowmen, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!"

Again the Ghost raised a cry, and shook its chain and wrung its shadowy hands.

"You are fettered," said Light, trembling. "Tell me why?"

"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?"Light trembled more and more.

"Or would you know," pursued the Ghost, "the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago. You have labored on it, since. It is a ponderous chain!"

Scrooge glanced about him on the floor, in the expectation of finding himself surrounded by some fifty or sixty fathoms of iron cable: but he could see nothing.

"Teru," he said, imploringly. " Teru Mikami, tell me more. Speak comfort to me, Teru!"

"I have none to give," the Ghost replied. "It comes from other regions, Light Yagami, and is conveyed by other ministers, to other kinds of men. Nor can I tell you what I would. A very little more, is all permitted to me. I cannot rest, I cannot stay, I cannot linger anywhere. My spirit never walked beyond our counting house, in life my spirit never roved beyond the narrow limits of our money-changing hole; and weary journeys lie before me!"

"But you were always a good man of business, Teru," faltered Light, who now began to apply this to himself.

"Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"

It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that were the cause of all its unavailing grief, and flung it heavily upon the ground again.

"At this time of the rolling year," the specter said "I suffer most. Light was very much dismayed to hear the specter going on at this rate, and began to quake exceedingly.

"Hear me!" cried the Ghost. "My time is nearly gone."

"I will," said Light. "But don't be hard upon me!"

"How it is that I appear before you in a shape that you can see, I may not tell. I have sat invisible beside you many and many a day."

It was not an agreeable idea. Light shivered, and wiped the perspiration from his brow.

"That is no light part of my penance," pursued the Ghost. "I am here tonight to warn you, that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate. A chance and hope of my procuring, Light."

"You were always a good friend to me," said Light.

"You will be haunted, by Three Shimigami." resumed the Ghost, "Expect the first tomorrow, when the bell tolls one. Expect the second on the next night at the same hour. The third upon the next night when the last stroke of twelve has ceased to vibrate."

The apparition walked backward from him; and at every step it took, the window raised itself a little, so that when the specter reached it, it was wide open. It beckoned Light to approach, which he did. When they were within two paces of each other, Mikami's Ghost held up its hand, warning him to come no nearer. Light followed to the window: desperate in his curiosity. He looked out.

The air was filled with phantoms, wandering in restless haste, and moaning as they went. Every one of them wore chains like Mikami's Ghost; none were free. Whether these creatures faded into mist, or mist enshrouded them, he could not tell. But they and their spirit voices faded together; and the night became, as it had been when he walked home.

Light closed the window, and examined the door by which the Ghost had entered. It was double-locked, as he had locked it with his own hands, and the bolts were undisturbed. He tried to say "Humbug!" but stopped at the first syllable. And being, from the emotion he had undergone, or the fatigues of the day, or his glimpse of the Invisible World, or the dull conversation of the Ghost, or the lateness of the hour, much in need of repose; went straight to bed, without undressing, and fell asleep upon the instant.


	3. The Frist of Three Shinigami

When Light awoke, it was so dark, that looking out of bed; he could scarcely distinguish the transparent window from the opaque walls of his chamber. He was endeavoring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes, when the chimes of a neighboring church struck the four quarters. So he listened for the hour. Light lay in this state until he remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost had warned him of a visitation when the bell tolled one. He resolved to lie awake until the hour was past; and, considering that he could no more go to sleep than go to Heaven, this was perhaps the wisest resolution in his power. The hour bell sounded, which it now did with a deep, dull, hollow, melancholy One. Light flashed up in the room upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn.

The curtains of his bed were drawn aside by a hand. Not the curtains at his feet, nor the curtains at his back, but those to which his face was addressed. The curtains of his bed were drawn aside; and Light, starting up into a half-recumbent attitude, found himself face to face with the unearthly visitor: It wore a tunic of white and it held a branch of green holly in its hand.

"Are you the Shinigami whose coming was foretold to me?" asked Light.

"I am."

The voice was singularly low, as if instead of being so close beside him, it were at a distance.

"Who, and what are you?" Light demanded.

"I am Sidoh, the God of Christmas Past."

"Long Past?" inquired Light:

"No. Your past."

Light then made bold to inquire what business brought him there.

"Your welfare," said the God.

Light expressed himself much obliged, but could not help thinking that a night of unbroken rest would have been more conducive to that end. The God must have heard him thinking, for it said immediately:

"Your reclamation, then. Take heed." The Shinigami put out its strong hand as it spoke, and clasped him gently by the arm. "Rise. And walk with me." The grasp was not to be resisted. Light rose: but finding that the God made towards the window, clasped his robe in supplication.

"I am mortal," Light remonstrated, "and liable to fall."

"Bear but a touch of my hand," said the Shinigami, "and you shall be upheld."

As the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, and stood upon an open country road, with fields on either hand. The city had entirely vanished. Not a vestige of it was to be seen. The darkness and the mist had vanished with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with snow upon the ground.

"Good Heaven!" said Light, clasping his hands together, as he looked about him. "I was bred in this place. I was a boy here."

The God gazed upon him mildly. Its gentle touch, though it had been light and instantaneous, appeared still present to the man's sense of feeling. He was conscious of a thousand odors floating in the air, each one connected with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and cares long, long, forgotten.

"You recollect the way?" inquired the God.

"Remember it!" cried Light with fervor -- "I could walk it blindfold."

They walked along the road, Light recognizing every gate, and post, and tree; until a little market town appeared in the distance, with its bridge, its church, and winding river. Some shaggy ponies now were seen trotting towards them with boys upon their backs, who called to other boys in country gigs and carts, driven by farmers. All these boys were in great spirits, and shouted to each other, until the broad fields were so full of merry music, that the crisp air laughed to hear it.

"These are but shadows of the things that have been," said the God. "They have no consciousness of us."

The travelers came on; and as they came, Light knew and named every one.

"The school is not quite deserted," said the Shinigami. "A solitary child, neglected by his friends, is left there still." Light said he knew it. And he sobbed. They left the high road, by a well-remembered lane, and soon approached a mansion of dull red brick, with a little weathercock-surmounted cupola, on the roof, and a bell hanging in it. It was a large house, but one of broken fortunes; for the spacious offices were little used, their walls were damp and mossy, their windows broken, and their gates decayed. They went, the God and Light, across the hall, to a door at the back of the house. It opened before them, and disclosed a long, bare, melancholy room, made barer still by lines of plain deal forms and desks. At one of these a lonely boy was reading near a feeble fire; and Light wept to see his poor forgotten self as he used to be. The God touched him on the arm, and pointed to his younger self, intent upon his reading. Light said, in pity for his former self, "Poor boy!" and cried again.

"I wish," Light muttered, putting his hand in his pocket, and looking about him, after drying his eyes with his cuff: "but it's too late now."

"What is the matter?" asked the God.

"Nothing," said Light. "Nothing. There was a boy singing a Christmas Carol at my door last night. I should like to have given him something: that's all."

The Shinigami smiled thoughtfully, and waved its hand: saying as it did so, "Let us see another Christmas!"

Light 's former self grew larger at the words, and the room became a little darker and more dirty. The panels shrunk, the windows cracked; fragments of plaster fell out of the ceiling, and the naked laths were shown instead; but how all this was brought about, Light knew no more than you do. He only knew that it was quite correct; that everything had happened so; that there he was, alone again, when all the other boys had gone home for the jolly holidays.

He was not reading now, but walking up and down despairingly. Light looked at the God, and with a mournful shaking of his head, glanced anxiously towards the door.

It opened; and a little girl, much younger than the boy, came darting in, and putting her arms about his neck, and often kissing him, addressed him as her "Dear, dear brother."

"I have come to bring you home, dear brother!" said the child, clapping her tiny hands, and bending down to laugh. "To bring you home, home, home!"

"Home, little Sayu?" returned the boy.

"Yes!" said the child, brimful of glee. "Home, for good and all. Home, forever and ever. Father is so much kinder than he used to be, that home's like Heaven! He spoke so gently to me one dear night when I was going to bed, that I was not afraid to ask him once more if you might come home; and he said 'Yes, you should'; and sent me in a coach to bring you!" said the child, opening her eyes, "And are never to come back here; but first, we're to be together all the Christmas long, and have the merriest time in all the world."

"You are quite a woman, little Sayu!" exclaimed the boy.

She clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his head; but being too little, laughed again, and stood on tiptoe to embrace him. Then she began to drag him, in her childish eagerness, towards the door; and he accompanied her.

"Always a delicate creature, whom a breath might have withered," said the God. "But she had a large heart!"

"You're right!" cried Light.

She died a woman," said the God. Light seemed uneasy in his mind; and answered briefly,

"Yes."

Although they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers passed and repassed; where shadowy carts and coaches battle for the way, and all the strife and tumult of a real city were. It was made plain enough, by the dressing of the shops, which here too it was Christmas time again; but it was evening, and the streets were lighted up.

The God stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked Light if he knew it.

"Know it!" said Light " I apprenticed here."

They went in. At sight of an old gentleman, sitting behind such a high desk, that if he had been two inches taller he must have knocked his head against the ceiling, Light cried in great excitement:

"Why, it's old Watari! Bless his heart; it's Watari alive again!"

Old Watari laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his hands; adjusted his capacious waistcoat; laughed all over himself, from his shows to his organ of benevolence; and called out in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat, jovial voice: "Yo ho, there! Light!" Light's former self, now grown a young man, came briskly in," Clear away!"

Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from public life for evermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room, as you would desire to see upon a winter's night. In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk, and made an orchestra of it, In came the housemaid, with her cousin, In came the cook, with her brother's friend. In came the boy from over the way, trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one, who was proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress. In they all came, anyhow and every how. Away they all went, twenty couple at once; hands half round and back again the other way; down the middle and up again; round and round in various stages of affectionate grouping. When this result was brought about, old Watari, clapping his hands to stop the dance, cried out, "Well done!" There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and there was cake, and there was a great piece of Cold Roast, and there was a great piece of Cold Boiled, and there were mince pies, and plenty of beer.

During the whole of this time, Light had acted like a man out of his wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He corroborated everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and underwent the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright faces of his former was turned from them, that he remembered the God, and became conscious that it was looking full upon him, while the light upon its head burnt very clear.

"A small matter," said the Shinigami, "to make these silly folks so full of gratitude."

"Small!" echoed Light.

The God signed to him to listen to the apprentice, who was pouring out hid heart in praise of Watari: and when he had done so, said,

"Why! Is it not! He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money: three or four perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?"

"It isn't that," said Light, heated by the remark, and speaking unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self. "It isn't that, Sidoh. He has the power to render me happy or unhappy; to make my service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add and count them up: what then? The happiness he gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune."

He felt the God's glance, and stopped.

"What is the matter?" asked the God.

"Nothing in particular," said Light.

"Something, I think?" the Shinigami insisted.

"No," said Light, "No. I should like to be able to say a word or two to my clerk just now! That's all."

Light's former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish; and Light and the God again stood side by side in the open air.

"My time grows short," observed the God. "Quick!" This was not addressed to Light, or to any one whom he could see, but it produced an immediate effect.


End file.
